massage : Gay & Black Glossary

Please Don’t Call

The Secret of My Success

No, I did not go to Thailand. I did this when I was living in New Westminster Canada. No, I was not handing out $1000 bills. You too can do what I did for under $50 total and should reap similar success.

So instead of playing Ain’t It Awful with your friends about how younger gays won’t give you the time of day, try this out…

Composing Your Ad

Start by placing a classified ad in your local gay newspaper, (Xtra West here in Vancouver), similar to this one: You can use abbreviations, such as HIV+ (Human Immuno-deficiency Virus Positive (infected)) or GWM (Gay White Male), but make sure you know what they mean and that they are used consistently in other ads.

• The opening line captures poetically what the experience will be like.
• Mention bodysage, backrub or bodyrub as the main component. No matter how sexually incompatible you turn out to be, the respondent can still enjoy a massage. Sex is more problematic. In printed advertisements, you can’t use the word massage as this is a sort of trademark of the Registered Massage Therapists. They have trained for at least two years in the medical use of massage.
• Mention no charge or people will presume you are a prostitute. Avoid the word free It implies must be some catch, that perhaps you are going to try to sell them something, or charge them for subsequent visits.
• Be specific about your age, height and weight. If you say late forties readers will assume you are ashamed of the way you look. If you withhold information, people will assume the worst. Even if you state your weight is 231, they will still fantasise it is 231 pounds of solid muscle.
• Telling your HIV+ status up front will help scare off ignorant people who would treat you like a leper or even turn violent when they learn your status. These people have unprotected anal sex naïvely trusting others to warn them that they are HIV (Human Immuno-deficiency Virus) +. Yet they shrink in terror at being kissed or touched by someone who openly acknowledges they are HIV+. They gag on gnats and swallow camels. Unfortunately, revealing your HIV+ status will drastically cut down your response. HIV+ conjures up an image of someone wasting away near death, so you need to counter that impression.

  Some HIV+ guys refuse to have sex with HIV- (Human Immuno-deficiency Virus Negative (virus free)) or unknown status strangers because they don’t want to deal with their paranoia. You would think Safe sex would be presumed unless you stated otherwise, but could say something like safe sex only to re-emphasise it. If you state that you are HIV-, the presumption is you want only other nominally HIV- guys. If that is not the case, you would have to say so.

• Avoid opinion words like attractive. State verifiable facts like "work out at gym six times a week, clean shaven or hairy body" instead.
• Mention something about your preferences, but don’t be too narrow. If you reveal no preferences, potential respondents will be afraid that you will reject them. If you specify too many, guys who fail just one of the criteria will unnecessarily disqualify themselves. Had I said, Blacks especially welcome a very large number of Asian and white guys would unnecesarily disqualify themselves. Further, many blacks would feel offended I was turned on by race. Better to say, All races welcome. Use objective criteria. If you ask for good looking guys, the cutest ones will reject themselves and the ugly ones will show up and declare themselves super-cuties. If you ask for guys under 42, nobody has any problem deciding if they qualify. For age restrictions, picking a number not divisible by ten signals you don’t take the limit too seriously.
• Saying sexual or non-sexual tends to attract a better class of caller. You want to discourage the phone sex types or the ones looking for a quick blow job. It also makes cute guys feel more comfortable. They don’t feel as pressured.
• The Internet reference lets you offer a picture and go on at great length about yourself and your preferences. You can provide a map and directions on how to get to your place. The Internet URL will cut down on the number of people who show up, since some won’t like your picture. Better to be rejected that way than to give a massage to someone who is not 100% eager. It is a bit silly of guests to be so fanatically concerned with your appearance when they enjoy the massage with their eyes closed the whole time, but that is the way people are. The quality of the people that do show up after seeing your Internet site is higher. They know in great detail what to expect which makes them comfortable. You too can feel comfortable because you know that they must find your appearance acceptable or they would not have shown up.
• Give your phone number. If guys have to jump through hoops to contact you, they won’t bother. Be aware you will get calls at all hours of the day and night. On the other hand, once you start getting overwhelmed with calls, you can leave out your phone number and use a website or email address or box number instead. It is a matter of balancing quantity with quality.

Handling Phone Calls

On the phone, it is best to be friendly, something like a doctor’s receptionist. Make an appointment. Avoid grilling the guy about his appearance so that he feels he could not possibly measure up to your expectations. It is best to just ask an open-ended question like, Tell me about yourself, "What do you look like? or How well did you fit the list of preferences in my ad?"

Make no specific promises of sex. The massage is guaranteed, but sex will require both of you to be turned on to the other. Point out that no matter what, he will still leave your place feeling great. He will win either way.

My mother’s advice is Never say yes. Never say no. Always say maybe, even if you are sure the guy will make you cream your jeans. Overpromising can be extremely embarrassing.

Ask him to avoid eating a heavy meal just before, to shower first and optionally to bring some music.

No-Shows

Here are the clues a guy will not show up for his appointment.

• He volunteers his penis size, usually 17.78 cm (7 in) or more.
• He asks your penis size.
• He asks for a special appointment time not convenient for you. About 90% of such people won’t show up, even ones that sound very friendly.
• He won’t give you his phone number in case you have to reschedule.
• You have to coax him in the tiniest bit to make an appointment.
• He talks dirty.
• If he cancels an appointment at the last minute, he will not show for the next one.
• He demands to come over right away.
• He refuses to make an appointment more than two days in advance and keeps calling back expecting you to have an immediate opening.
• He demands a guarantee you will have sex with him.
• He asks detailed questions about your anatomy.
• He is petulant when you have to schedule him 7+ days into the future.
• He complains you live too far away. He asks you to pack all your stuff up including the table and drag it over to his place. Portable massage tables are not portable in the sense laptops are. They are portable in the sense dishwashers are, not screwed to the floor. You would need a car since you have so much other stuff besides the table to carry.
• He insists you do the massage on bed or on the floor, rather than a table, even when you explain that is hard on your back.
• He sounds skeptical when you tell him that based on what he has told you that you would probably like him and would enjoy massaging him. He is afraid you will reject him when he shows up.
• The guy goes on and on about how his muscles ache and how badly he needs a massage and how much he wants a massage. If you weren’t such a heartless brute you would immediately rent a truck and bring your table over to minister to him, after all you owe him a massage don’t you?
• The guy sounds extremely turned on. You are exactly the kind of guy he is after. He can barely wait to meet you. He would walk over miles of broken glass to meet you. He protests there is absolutely utterly no possible way he would not show up. etc. etc. These guys never show up. They jerk off and instantly lose all interest.

1. The further into the future you book an appointment, the lower the chance the guy will show up. You can simply refuse to book more than a few days into the future. The problem then is guys will think you are giving them the brushoff when you have to tell them to call back later. Tell them right up front the problem, then they will be less likely to take it personally.
2. Avoid inviting them in the first place. You are not obligated to invite everyone who calls over, even if they do meet the basic criteria of your ad. If they give any of the above clues they will be a no-show, don’t invite them.
3. The less sexual the tone of your ad and the less sexual the way you talk, the better your odds of the guy showing up. The key is to keep everything low key so the guy does not think it is a big deal and get cold feet.
4. Ask each guy for his phone number and a time he would like a reminder call. If he won’t give you that, don’t book an appointment.
5. Ask guys to make a confirmation call. If you don’t get the call, you know you will have a no-show. It does not reduce the number of no-shows, but it gives you more warning so you don’t waste time waiting around for them.
6. Maintain a list of guys who might be able to show up on short notice. When you have a no-show, you can often quickly find a happy replacement.

By the time people arrive at the door, they are pretty committed to getting a massage. In the hundreds of massages I have given, only three people who came over declined to be massaged. One left, presumably because my appearance failed to meet his fantasies, one ran in terror when the topic of HIV came up and the third, Bernard, became my lover.

When I lived on Burrard Street, in the gay ghetto of the West End, nearly everyone who called made an appointment. When I lived in New Westminster (a 1.5 hour Skytrain-bus trip from downtown), about 28% of people didn’t make an appointment, complaining either that they need to come over right now or that they didn’t want to come all the way out to New Westminster. When I lived on Burrard Street, nearly everyone showed up for their appointment. In New West, I had a 35% no-show rate. Why?

1. My best explanation is that people don’t really want to come all the way out to New Westminster, but they make an appointment anyway. When they later reconsider, why don’t they call and give some phony excuse and free up the slot for someone else? It would be embarrassing for them to reneg. By simply not showing up they avoid having to make up some excuse. Perhaps they fear I would chastise them if they told the truth.
2. My second explanation for the difference is that I used to advertise in Angles, a gay lib paper. It is now defunct. I now advertise in Xtra West a commercial paper. It attracts a different readership. I am now getting more inexperienced people prone to cold feet.
3. I am also four years older. That makes me somewhat less of a sex magnet. People still want me to massage them, but are less willing to jump through hoops. They have less compunction about treating me with contempt. Unfortunately, to pretty young airheads, for every year you age, you gradually lose your status as a human being in gay society. I’m a bit testy on this an often put brats in their place when they step too far out of line.

First Meeting

Olfaction plays an important rôle in making people feel comfortable. Get a large pot of boiling water and add some cloves, cinnamon, vanilla, juniper berries, coffee grounds, nutmeg and ginger. Allow this to simmer for an half an hour before your guest arrives. Your apartment will be filled with a warm, homey smell that spells safety and relaxation.

You have to take the bad with the good. Sometimes the guys look absolutely nothing like the way they advertised themselves. When this happens, I think to myself, "This guy was so keen to meet me, that he was willing to lie and risk my anger. I should cut him some slack.". Sometimes they are obnoxious, drunk, demanding and have stinky feet. On the other hand, sometimes they are so beautiful and loving they take your breath away. You will definitely meet boys hundreds of times more beautiful than you could ever have picked up cruising. Don’t let their beauty intimidate you. Just like any other not-so-handsome guest, they want you to love them and pamper them.

Pre-Massage Talk

Some guys like to chat between 15 minutes to an hour before settling into the massage. Others require physical touch before they are relaxed enough to talk.

Repeatedly reassure your guest that the entire point of this exercise is his comfort and pleasure. He can take off or keep on as much clothing as he desires. He can have the massage on the bed or the floor, depending on how much pressure he likes. Usually even the shyest men discard clothing during the massage and ask for more of their bodies to be worked on.

You will tend to get a disproportionate number of people from other cultures with quite different ideas of appropriate topics for small talk. Maintain your sense of humour when one asks how many bowel movements a day you have.

Ask your guest if there are any parts of his body he does not want you to touch, or parts that are sore, or that need special attention. You should avoid giving massages to people running a fever or suffering from acute arthritis.

I usually start the massage by busily fussing about getting ready warming the various oils or melting some grated cocoa-butter in the microwave. I set out candles, and lower the lighting. This takes the embarrassing focus away from my guest who is undressing.

Learning To Massage

You might take a course from The Body Electric. They focus more on the sensual and erotic aspects than your local night school class would.

Massage trades with guys who know more about massage than you can be intimidating, but you will learn a lot and you receive a great massage yourself. Massage trades tend to be non-sexual.

Try massaging yourself to learn what various things feel like. When you are massaging, imagine what your hands would feel like to your guest. Sometimes this imagination can become so real you would swear you are actually feeling what he is feeling.

Don’t worry about perfection. Even an inept massage still feels wonderful.

Massage Tables

For other massage paraphernalia such as table covers, face covers, bulk oil, special detergent etc. you can browse the online catalog at Living Earth Crafts. They don’t have their complete catalog and price list online, but they will snail mail you a beautiful catalog. From then on you can order via the Internet, though they don’t mention that on their website.

You don’t need any of that just to get started.

Tips

• Make sure the room is warm 27°C (80°F). Because giving massage is a form of exercise, a room that feels hot to you may feel uncomfortably cold to your guest. If you suspect your guest is cool, cover him with a sheet or towel, stop any drafts and/or turn up the heat.
• If you get a hard on, don’t poke it against your guest unless you are 110% sure he appreciates it.
• Feet tend to get cold, so need frequent work. Large muscles in the shoulders, lower back, thighs and buttocks usually crave the most attention. Gently massaging the forearms and calves is surprisingly pleasurable.
• Besides deep pressure, light strokes, cross strokes, figure eights, using your forearms, fingertips or knuckles, scratching, rubbing, patting, blowing and tickling are nice for variety.
• I find it helps to pretend this person is going to become my lover. (Spiritually-minded people might imagine they are massaging an indwelling omnipresent God.) That helps put me more in tune with the person, makes me more adventurous and confident and ensures I don’t do the massage in a perfunctory way. I’m astonished that people never resent the implied intimacy. Perhaps they are too focused on the pleasant sensations.
• Keep going until all the muscles have turned to jelly. Even the most rock-like knots will eventually unravel. Count on spending at least one and a half hours and make sure you have scheduled enough time in case it takes three. The more muscular the guy, the longer it takes and the more fun the work is since you can feel all the individual muscles clearly.

 Feedback

People vary widely in tastes. Pay attention to your guest’s reactions, not on what you think should feel good. Ideally the muscle you are working on should relax and the jaw should relax and you should see a relaxed smile. On the other hand some people attempt to maintain wooden, stoic expressions no matter how good they feel, perhaps thinking it unmanly to let you know what pleasures them. Many guys will make sighing sounds or arch their bodies toward you when you do something they particularly like.

Some people will feel pain with even the slightest pressure to some unlikely spot on the body. Trust them when they tell you it hurts. If you do something that hurts or is ticklish, they will usually twitch or tighten up. Most people will just grin and bear it when you increase pressure too much or too quickly. Sometimes the most exquisitely pleasurable probings are simultaneously painful.

When in doubt, ask, but avoid chattering. Sometimes when my intuition fails I just ask "What part of your body feels like it needs attention now?". People are usually unnecessarily shy about revealing what pleasures them. To guide them along, you can ask multiple choice questions.

Music

Odours

You can buy these aromatic essential oils at massage, aromatherapy or health food stores.

The fragrances I use are:

• citrus: grapefruit, orange, lime, tangerine, lemon grass.
• woodsy: cedar, fir needle.
• aphrodisiac: ylang ylang, lavender, nutmeg, anise (liquorice), cucumber (for women).
• soreness: energy blend (rosemary, grapefruit, peppermint), wintergreen, spearmint.
• wakeup: ravensara, clary sage.

When you are using a fragrance and you are unsure if your guy will like it, try it out first on the feet, far away from his nose. If you get a good reaction, you can try it out on the body closer to the nose later. I usually start with lime, a safe, univerally-acceptable, masculine scent. There seem to be two kinds of people, ones that like nearly all the fragrances and ones that are indifferent to or even don’t like any of them. So if you get a good reaction with one fragrance, you can be more bold with others. Conversely, if you get a bad reaction with any fragrance, back off on the others. Just trust your intuition. Even if you guess wrongly, at worst, the odour will be mildly irritating and distracting. These essential oils are not perfumes which can feel, to some, like somebody probing your nose with an ice pick. Aromatherapy scents are much softer.

Lubricants

• hazelnut: delicious Christmasy smell and taste. Best for tongue play. It is expensive and hard to find.
• cocoa butter: must be grated and melted, chocolately smell, waxy, long lasting.
• sesame: very slippery and thick. fairly strong odour. Mix with cocoa butter to cover the smell.
• grape seed: very light, good for faces.
• apricot kernel: medium, good all round oil.
• almond: long lasting, luxurious feel.
• avocado: light clean feeling.
• soy: generic massage oil, accepts fragrances. Inexpensive.
• baby oil: mineral oil that does not require refrigeration, very light. Sometimes has a baby powder scent.
• Oasis oil: water dispersible. A mixture of almond, avocado, grapeseed, safflower, sesame and vitamin E. Easier to wash out of linens. Not a particularly pleasant taste.
• hemp oil: a little goes a long way. It lasts as long time without going sticky. It is also very expensive. It smells a bit like marijuana leaves.

You can also use lotions such as Vaseline Intensive Care. People from tropical countries sometimes prefer oil-free or dry massages. Scented baby powder is nice too, especially for hairy people. I think the scent reminds guys of the loving care they received as infants. They go into a smiling trance. Check the Yellow Pages under Massage for sources of special water-soluble gels and lotions.

Some people like to be almost swimming in oil, others like it almost dry to create maximum friction with your hands. Generally the hairier your guest is the more oil you need. I find very hairy guys almost impossible to oil-massage. My fingers get tangled in their sticky body hair. I find the experience quite gross. Other people like it.

I like to heat the oils with a Salton cup warmer. That is not entirely satisfactory because the oil drips and cakes onto the hot surface.

Attire

Flaws

In my ad, I ask for smooth guys so the following flaw problem rarely occurs. Sometimes a guy will show up with blackheads or pimples all over his back or chest. I find massaging these somewhat gross since I get little bits of grit all over my hands. What to do? Massage the area vigorously with sesame oil and coarse salt. This is mildly painful for your guest. Bathe the area with a soapy washcloth and pat dry. This will get rid of nearly all of them and you can proceed to massage normally. I could use a little face-saving subterfuge that this painful salt massage is standard procedure for all my guests, but I find a policy of ruthless honesty is best to build trust.

Turning the Massage into Sex

You can gently increase the feeling of intimacy by resting the guy’s arm on your knee while you massage his shoulders or upper arm, or just by allowing your body to rest against his when it is natural and convenient to do so.

Don’t leave any part of the body out — including face, scalp, perineum and hands. Try to give the genitals slightly less attention but otherwise treat them just like other parts of the body. This reduces embarrassment and then allows your guest to use body language to request more attention to his preferred erogenous zones.

The key is to be reluctant, giving always a little bit less sex than desired. You might give a few quick licks, then return to the massage. Be careful, sesame oil is so slippery, it is very easy to make someone come with just a few flicks of the wrist.

If the massage takes a sexier turn, you can use your mouth too — to lick nipples, the backs and fronts of the knees or the scrotum.

Anally erogenous guys often like you to massage them from the inside and outside of their bodies at once. This can be quite a delicious novelty for them.

For hints on giving your guest maximum pleasure from oral or anal sex see my two other essays. Almost all guys will want manual penile stimulation. The majority want manual anal stimulation, usually with finger penetration, but some are sharply offended when you try either. They probably believe enjoying anal stimulation would mean they were not properly masculine, or they may be wired differently from others. Most want me to give them a blow job, though some deny themselves that pleasure on conservative safe sex grounds. Fewer want to be screwed. Fewer still want to screw. Almost none want to give me a blow job. My height attracts a subclass of people who fit this profile. Your mileage may vary. In any case, the people who show up at your door will want to lie back and have you do things to them, not the reverse.

Since you may be dealing with relatively inexperienced people, it is even more than usually important that you take the lead it setting down safe sex guidelines. You can have some very unpleasant scenes if someone finds out afterward you are HIV+ even if you did nothing unsafe. Inexperienced people are freaked even at the thought they drank a glass of water you gave them and can become panic stricken or even violent. Trying to calm their fears by explaining the rules of safe sex can backfire. It just gets them even more upset because they suddenly realise the extreme risks they have been taking in the past with other partners. If you are HIV+, putting that fact up front in your ad can help avoid such scenes.

Guys signal they would like to turn the massage into two-way sex by repeatedly touching you. They signal the desire for one-way sex by arching or spreading the legs — and, of course, by getting a hard on.

Evoking Childhood

These techniques work best after they have come. Some guys will want to leap up and run away immediately after they have come. They are missing the best part.

Saying Goodbye

Some guys like to shower afterwards. Have a clean towel and some nice-smelling (but not flowery), strong, sanitary, liquid soap for them, such as Dial bodywash. Also provide a citrus shampoo to help remove any oil in their hair such as Redmond Aussie Citrifier or Citré Shine. For cleanup, most guys want a business-like, brisk mood, contrasting with the sensuous laid back mood of the massage itself.

Massage puts people into a euphoric, stoned, relaxed state. Occasionally they have difficulty walking or putting on their clothes. Their pupils are dilated. You are usually in a happy relaxed state too, but nowhere near as zonked. It is your duty to reassure them that these feelings are normal. If they are going to drive, encourage them to rest a while first. You can wake people up a bit with tapotement -- the massage technique favoured by movie gangsters and some zingy scents.

Don’t expect them to be polite, especially right after they come. No matter how well the massage went, they will often leave without a hug, hand shake or even a thank you. That’s just the way guys are. They are a bit embarrassed by the intimacy they allowed themselves during the massage and they need to compensate. You will never hear from most of them again no matter how well the massage went.

Repeats & Reciprocation

It is much easier massage someone you have massaged before. You know where he likes to be touched and how hard. However, it can be frustrating because you come to expect some reciprocation after you spend week after week pleasuring him.

The unfortunate side effect of offering free massages is you tend to attract people with absolutely no interest in reciprocation.

Caveats

Most of the time, the sexual episodes are pretty one-sided. Massage turns others on more than it will turn you on. Don’t expect people to reciprocate. Even if they wanted to give you a massage or sexual pleasure in return, they are usually too jellified to attempt it. I know I am belabouring this point, but it is important.

People often leave acting as if they were in love. Don’t get your hopes up. It is the massage — not necessarily you personally that turned them on. No matter what they say, you won’t see most of them ever again. They will, however, respect you in the morning. I find callers are usually deferential when they call back asking for a repeat. Most guys assume you would only want to play with them once, no matter how good a time you both had. You must reassure them that you want them to come back if indeed you would like to see them again. You must balance this against the error of appearing too clingy. Normally-reserved guys often frighten themselves with how intimate and loving they let themselves become during the massage and snap closed.

I found myself getting suicidally depressed by thinking of every massage guest who never came back as a failure. The way I looked at it, the guy tried me out and found me wanting. This is not necessarily so. Most guys are simply not interested in a relationship. They just want to play with as many boys as possible. You have to look at the encounters as fun way to play with a large variety of people. People in committed relationships might envy me for having a date every night with a different boy for three weeks in advance. If someone who is looking for a relationship decides you are not a suitable match it means simply that, not that there is necessarily anything wrong with either of you.

Repeat visits are more relaxed since you already know how to pleasure the guy, but you might tend to abbreviate the rituals. Your guy may feel hurt if you do this and won’t show up again.

Guys talking to you on the phone will create a god-like fantasy creature around any details you tell them. You will never quite measure up to that fantasy, so people will always be somewhat disappointed to meet you. They will go through with the massage anyway and get turned on as a matter of course. The advantage is that you end up with guys much handsomer than would normally pick you. The disadvantage is that you often spend hours massaging guys who are only lukewarm to you, who will never come back.

The Strokes

Primates have been giving each other backrubs since the beginning of time. Everyone knows instinctively how to do it. There are three simple rules:

1. If he likes it, do it some more.
2. If he doesn’t like it, try something else.
3. Focus on how good it feels to your hands to touch.

You don’t need a huge repertoire of fancy moves. People have an incredible tolerance for boring repetition while they are being massaged.

Swedish Strokes

Basic Strokes

Circular Strokes

Scooping Strokes

Counter Strokes

Calcification

Esalen Strokes

Pressure Points

Lymph Nodes

Butt Massage

What do you do about the fact your finger is now contaminated with bacteria? You don’t want to spread that over the rest of his skin.

1. Use a condom or finger cot.
2. Wash your hands with antiseptic cleanser such as Germistat which you can get at a hospital supply store.
3. Don’t worry about it, the guy may have done an extremely thorough job of cleaning himself beforehand.

Penis Massage

Tapotement

Washing

Why Do It?

• If I did this professionally, I could not choose my clients. This way I can limit my clients to people I find sexually appealing.
• If I did this professionally, my social status would be roughly that of a prostitute.
• By offering free massage, much younger and handsomer guys show up at my door than if I did not. Further, large numbers of them phone me asking for appointments. They would not do that if I were doing it professionally.
• It’s good karma. If the Buddhists are right, in some future life, or maybe even this one, I will get hundreds of massages.
• I’m far more likely to be offered a massage if I give them than if I don’t.
• It’s pleasant exercise. Massaging makes my hands and arms are grow stronger and stronger. I get compliments on them. That did not happen when I was doing just gym exercises.
• If I limit giving at most one massage a day, I can put my heart into it. I don’t have to worry about saving my hands or back muscles that way you do when you work professionally.
• Even though I am gay, I have a girl friend. She says because of my massage skills I have totally spoiled her for any other man. Tell your straight friends to learn massage if they want to attract females.

Why Not Do It?

• The phone rings at all hours of the day and night from people demanding massages right now! They seem to think I am some sort of massage/pizza delivery service.
• There is some risk inviting strangers into your home. I’m a big guy so few people would want to get in a fight with me. I did have trouble once with a guy who threatened me. He freaked out over HIV even though he was in no danger.
• So many times some boy captures my heart, acts as if he wants to become my lover, oif, or at least a regular, then never calls again. I can’t stand having my hopes dashed over and over like that.
• People frequently don’t show for their appointments, offer no excuse and sometimes later demand I reschedule them. It is still quite a letdown when they don’t show up.
• Sometimes people are not as they advertised themselves. You have the choice of rudely refusing to massage them or of gritting your teeth and going through with massaging someone you find unpleasant to touch. I remind myself that professional masseurs rarely get to massage people they find sexually appealing.
• People are in general quite presumputous, acting as if I owed them a massage at any time convenient for them. People who have not met me treat me with little respect. They don’t value the massage nearly as highly as I think they should, given the effort I put into it.
• You are offering something for nothing. This tends to attract takers rather than givers.
• It tends to take over your life. It gets very hard to schedule time for anything else when you have people begging you to fill up every speck of your time, scheduled three weeks in advance, to look after their needs.
• The people who come are completely passive. They just lie there and let me pleasure them. They almost never do anything in return. They often refuse to even give me a good bye hug, the thing I most want in return. It is hard not to feel used. Some reciprocate, but not quite as I might hope, with gifts of chocolate, food, candles and marijuana.

Summary

Anybody should be able to do what I have done and should get similar results. There is much more I’d like to tell you, but I have told you enough to get you started. Feel free to experiment and improvise.

I have described many possible things you could do. You would do only some of them that felt appropriate for any particular guest on any particular visit. I fear that people coming to see me after reading this essay went away disappointed that they did not experience everything in my published repertoire on their first visit.